The Data Engineering Laboratory converts the data associated with aspects of materials design into an interactive framework, providing a joint scientific and educational understanding of materials. To this end, we have developed the Solar Data Hub. This includes a database for materials related to clean energy and enhancing a circular economy, and a database related to ‘Solar Demography and Justice’ tracking the usage and availability of materials.
Clean Energy Material Tool
Based on data capturing the toxicity across the chemical process and the underlying material chemistry, the use of machine learning approaches has been used to define similarity between materials and define pathways for the design of safer alternative materials. We have developed machine learning tools to explore complex relationships between material chemistry and properties.
Solar Demography and Justice Tool
This tool tracks the access in solar panel usage across economic and social cross-sections of the population over time. This interactive tool provides a framework for advocacy, showing the socio-economic barriers to solar energy utilization, while also incorporating chemical safety and availability to better understand the challenges.